Lobbying
Our next agenda item relates to our lobbying inquiry. Following our two oral evidence sessions, the clerks have prepared an issues paper that summarises the themes that emerged.
I suggest that we have a general discussion about the evidence that we received and decide how to develop our inquiry. In particular, it would be useful for members to consider whether they would like to take further evidence or whether they feel that we have sufficient information to be able to begin to formulate our thinking on the various policy options that are open to us.
We would never have been able to speak to everyone we wanted to speak to. However, we managed to get evidence from the broadest spectrum possible by speaking to representative bodies. We need not take further evidence; we have taken enough to enable us to start forming views about where we go from here.
I agree with Tricia Marwick that we have sufficient evidence from representative bodies from across the spectrum.
I will make one or two points that might help the clerks to prepare the case for our decision. It would be invaluable if they could prepare a précis stating the strength of the case for a voluntary code, giving the pros and cons for one and the weight of the representations. It follows that, if a précis for a voluntary code is prepared, one should also be prepared for a compulsory code. I realise that there is much less support for a compulsory code—at least, that is what I believe—but it would be useful to have an objective assessment of such a code.
It is important that we have an accurate and objective assessment of whether the bodies concerned would be content with one overall voluntary code or whether they would prefer a number of separate voluntary codes, with one for each body. My impression was that there was a strong preference for one code, but it would be helpful to have a detailed assessment of whether my impression is correct.
It would be useful to have the pros and cons of, or the strength of the case for, registration, with an analysis of the views of those who supported registration and of those who did not.
Finally, I sense that there was considerably less support for statutory regulation than there was for registration. It would be helpful to have a brief assessment of each option in the form of a précis—perhaps just on one, two or three pieces of paper.
I do not disagree with anything that Lord James said. However, I would also like us to consider what sanctions would be open to the committee and the Parliament, depending on which route we decided to take.
I would also like us to consider a third option: that we do nothing. Although I say "do nothing", I will qualify that and say that we should perhaps do something. We should make a declaration of the conduct that we expect from people who come into contact with the Parliament. We should also point out that the code of conduct places the onus on MSPs to conduct themselves absolutely appropriately.
Another issue came out in the evidence: for some organisations, we are becoming a welcome burden. I realise that outside organisations are not part of our remit but, at a later stage, we could discuss—perhaps with the Procedures Committee—how best to help them to be part of the process. The last thing that we want to do is to exclude people merely by asking them to come and give evidence; if that becomes such a burden that they cannot participate, we defeat our own purpose. In some ways, that concerned me more than the other points that were made in our evidence-taking sessions.
Patricia Ferguson said that we should perhaps do nothing and then qualified that statement; however, the main issue is whether—I think that this is what Patricia Ferguson meant—we move away from our current focus, which is on MSPs. That needs to be discussed in addition to the other options that have been mentioned.
I am sorry for being late. Are we having a general discussion or are we just considering whether to take further evidence?
We are deciding whether we need to take further evidence. So far, the consensus seems to be that we have sufficient evidence and that the clerks should now concentrate on producing a policy options paper for our next meeting. I have opened the floor to comments on that. You can say whether you think that we need to take more evidence, or you can raise the issues that you believe the clerks should present to us at our next meeting.
I agree with much of what my colleagues have said. We do not need any more evidence at the moment, although, depending on what the committee decides to do, we might need to take further evidence at a later stage. I do not want to prejudge any decision but, if we settle on a regulatory or registrative process, the detail will be important and I suspect that we will need to take further soundings with outside bodies about how such a process would work in practice. However, I am not convinced that we will necessarily need to opt for regulation or registration. At the moment, I suggest that we take no further evidence.
I agree with Patricia Ferguson that, although the focus of the inquiry has been on whether there is a need to regulate and register lobbyists, the evidence has shown the importance of the Parliament's being accessible to groups that might not have had good access. Rather than being passive recipients of lobbying, the Parliament should seek out lobbyists—if that does not make members feel uneasy. We should seek views and information from the less vocal members of our communities and the less powerful interest groups. More work is required in that area.
If we were considering going down the regulation and registration route, we would have to discuss the issues in more detail. I am beginning to form a view on the principles, but the practice gives me greater problems. I would welcome concrete proposals. I suggested at a previous meeting that we could use the £5,000 threshold at which people have to declare political donations. If we worked out a proposal based on that threshold, that would give us something practical, rather than theoretical, to discuss. It would be good to get down to the detail and work out what would happen if we introduced a specific financial threshold over which people had to declare interests. I would welcome specific proposals, if that is not too much to ask. They would not have to be worked out in huge detail. There are many implications.
I do not want to prejudge the issue. I have my own views on what might be necessary, but we heard evidence of the difficulty that we might have in dealing with law firms that have public consultancies, owing to the confidentiality agreements that they enter into with their clients. Further work needs to be done on that issue.
It is difficult to have these discussions without prejudging the issue. The evidence that we received from the full-time professional lobbying organisations was that they were open and transparent. The other organisation had slightly more difficulty. More work is needed to explore what kind of system we could put in place and whether a law firm would be able to comply with it.
You have flagged up a series of issues. Should we proceed to take evidence along those lines?
We have got enough information from the evidence sessions to be able to have a full and proper discussion of the route that we might want to go down. We could go down a regulation and registration route or a route that is based on the current situation but that encourages greater access and puts more of the onus on MSPs. There is a range of options.
Each of the routes requires further work. If we were to choose to go down one of the routes, we would have to take further evidence at that stage; at this stage, however, we should have further discussion among ourselves. As I said, I would like to hang the discussion on specific points, such as the level of the threshold and the difficulties with law firms or other big firms that employ in-house public consultancies. Our decision to go forward will hang on those issues.
You are content that we proceed as directed, with the proviso that we can call for more evidence if we decide to go down a specific route.
Ken Macintosh's suggestion makes a lot of sense. If, for example, the committee was minded to go down the route of having one overall voluntary code, it would be necessary to consult on how best that should be done, because no draft code exists. He has made points that are relevant for the next stage, once we have come to a view on what the recommended route should be.
We can sign off a number of matters now. Patricia Ferguson commented on how we should engage with organisations and groups that are currently not engaging with the Parliament. Simultaneously with this inquiry, we could make contact with the Procedures Committee about how we can create better access to the Parliament. We probably do not need to have further discussion on that; we can perhaps make progress on it.
Ken Macintosh suggested a £5,000 threshold. My view is that that should not be the test and that £5,000 is not an appropriate threshold. Organisations and individuals have a democratic right to lobby the Parliament; we should not suggest that they do not have that right. However, there is a distinction between individuals and organisations that lobby us on their own behalf and commercial organisations that are engaged to do so on behalf of others. That is the clear dividing line. We should consider the difference between commercial organisations and other individuals and organisations. The issue is not the financial threshold, but whether organisations are lobbying on their own behalf or on behalf of others.
We must carefully consider registration and regulation. The evidence, as I understand it, is that voluntary codes do not work. Whether the codes are from a commercial or an umbrella organisation, the evidence is that they will work only when the sign-up rate is almost 100 per cent. Regardless of whether the code is voluntary or statutory, there has to be some monitoring of its effectiveness. We may decide either that it is better for organisations to monitor themselves and their client organisations or that the Parliament should do it on their behalf. We need to explore that area further.
By and large, the evidence is fairly thin on all sides. We have considered the matter from totally different angles, which is why it is suggested that there are separate issues here. The issue of how the voluntary and third sectors participate is a legitimate one, but there are public concerns about the lobbying activities of commercial organisations. We should separate the two issues. I am not totally convinced about what the voluntary sector says about barriers. The barriers that it is concerned about are not necessarily ones that we would consider from the point of view of standards; they are more to do with the accessibility debate. That is something that, tangentially, we might want to argue about.
I thought that the Stirling media research institute was at least trying to identify public concern and to act on it, but it did not furnish us with enough international evidence of other regulatory frameworks that have made a difference. That information may exist—I may have missed it when I was reading at the weekend—but it would be helpful if the institute could give us the further information that it indicated it could get for us, so that we can arrive at a conclusion. I am edging towards understanding the institute's concerns, but the information that I have seen so far has not convinced me.
Ken Macintosh is right about law firms with public consultancies and the confidentiality contained in that legal framework. We need to address that as part of our overall assessment. We could consider the voluntary sector separately from the commercial operators, but there is an issue about those operators utilising the voluntary sector to subvert the regulatory framework under which they operate.
If members are content, the clerks will prepare the issues paper for our next meeting, setting out the policy options that we have just discussed. Bearing in mind the points that have been raised, we can, if we decide to go down a particular route, take further evidence as we proceed.